Formally established in 2016 by Emmett Scanlon in collaboration with Laurence Lord, Out.Post.Office. builds on many years of work in live-project and socially-engaged design studios at UCD Architecture by Emmett Scanlon and Orla Murphy. Within the unit, Masters students of Architecture are invited to work in partnership with specific community groups outside the University.

The first iteration of Out.Post.Office. was an eighteen month long collaboration with project partners Phizzfest / Reimagining Phibsborough called This Must Be the Place (We’ve Waited Years to Love).

During this period, MArch 1 and MArch 2 students along with students from the Lucerne School of Engineering and Architecture, developed proposals for the public realm, vacant sites, the underused land and Dalymount Stadium all within Phibsborough. The culmination of this was an exhibition and a series of presentations by the students in May 2017 at the Chocolate Factory in Dublin.

Out.Post.Office. intends to develop the collaborative and participatory skills of students, skills that are essential to their future practice. Using the support of the unit, students establish an awareness of the social responsibility of the architect and are empowered to produce work of exceptional quality that makes a real difference to the communities that they work with.

Out.Post.Office. aims to work with public or voluntary sector groups or agencies that have limited resources but that are committed to a project. By working with students the intention is that these groups can obtain ambitious and sophisticated design proposals that they would not have otherwise been able to access.

A key component of Out.Post.Office. is ensuring students present and discuss their work outside the University and their projects are displayed as part of public events, festivals and in everyday life. This is core to ensuring continuing, direct and meaningful engagement of the work of the School and the world outside. The unit is also committed to actively developing a critical relevance for architecture in Ireland through participation, discussion, exhibition and publication.